synchronicity
by Frog-kun
Summary: What if the real Syaoran never had to make that wish to turn back time? SyaoSaku. Mature content warning. Reposted with separated chapters.
1. one

**Author's note: **I'm going to stress this again before we begin the story: this fic will have mature content _not _suitable for younger readers. Please, if you are under sixteen, _do not read this fic_. Normally, I wouldn't be so fussed about things like ratings, but I wrote this story with a purely adult audience in mind. So please bear that in mind as you read this fic, otherwise, you can turn back now.

Title and song lyrics credits go to Synchronicity performed by Yui Makino (Sakura's voice actress).

**synchronicity **

_Where is this warmth going?  
>When it's tomorrow, it'll vanish<br>If I synchronized the heartbeats of our chests  
>Would I be able to fall to the same depth as you?<em>

* * *

><p><strong>one;<strong>

* * *

><p>The harsh desert wind whipped strands of chestnut-coloured hair across her face. She was accustomed to the arid heat, but as the sun continued to glare mercilessly down from a cloudless blue sky, she had to pause in her step for a moment. She adjusted the cowl of her white hood back neatly over her head from the lopsided position the wind had blown it to. Then, with long, dainty fingers, she wiped the collecting sweat off her forehead. She knew, however, that it was best not to remain still. She had somewhere she wanted to go.<p>

As she crested one final dune, the town came clearly into view. It was as lively as usual today, and for a moment she had to pause again just to watch the villagers pace around the streets leisurely at their daily business. It made her smile, especially when her nose detected the faint smell of cooking from the distance. The town smelt like salt today, like that of the ocean. She had never been to the ocean before, but she had heard stories, mostly from _him_. She longed to hear more. His hut was located at the outskirts of town and was boxed in snugly between other similar structures. It was nondescript; it was low-ceilinged and it vaguely resembled an igloo (she had heard stories about igloos too). It was designed that way to absorb damage on particularly windy days. Though plain in exterior, it was no less comfortable than the castle – this she knew from experience. She would always expect a warm welcome there.

Still, when she lifted her hand and knocked upon the wooden door, she did it somewhat hesitantly. She did not want to intrude. She waited, hands behind her back, her gaze directed pointedly at the sky. Her heart was thumping.

He opened the door for her within half a minute of her knocking. She drew a breath then and felt a shiver of anticipation tingle down her spine. A sweet, almost sickly emotion swelled in her chest and felt ready to burst.

She smiled and walked inside.

* * *

><p><em><strong>Extracts from the journal of Queen Nadeshiko:<strong>_

… _I had a dream…_

… _Only I and the boy who is not of this world can see the Wings. I watch them spread and envelope my daughter's fate ever further. There is nothing, I think, that is more frightening than the simple passage of time…_

… _Wishes bring such pain. Fei-Wang Reed has a wish and so do I. My wish is the same as my husband's, the same as my son's, the same as the villagers of Clow, the same as Syaoran's…_

… _He is on a journey. A fruitless one, I fear. For there is no way to stop the curse of the Black Wings without paying the price he is not prepared to pay, not unless time itself loses its meaning…_

…_ I saw the possibility in my dream. There are many universes that exist on the hinge of a single moment. I can only see a sparse hint of them in my dreams. This dream rests upon Syaoran and what, to him, the passage of time can mean, for him and for Sakura…_

* * *

><p>"So how was your journey, Syaoran? Was it fun? Did you take care of yourself? Did you eat your vegetables?" she asked him.<p>

He laughed; he couldn't help it. "Yes, I did, actually," he answered as he closed the door of the hut. He propped himself comfortably on his plainly decorated bed sheets.

Eagerly, Sakura sat down beside him. "So what did you do? What places did you see?"

"Well…" He scratched the back of his head sheepishly. It was difficult to talk about those sorts of experiences with Sakura, particularly because she had no idea why he went through all of the trouble. In fact, he hated to leave Sakura at all, especially these days. Yet for her sake, he strove to find enjoyable aspects of his travels to relate to her.

She listened attentively, the way she always did. When he was done speaking, she clapped her hands together. He found himself admiring the mischievous sparkle in her green eyes before he remembered abruptly what it meant.

She leaned forward suddenly and poked him on the forehead, then fell back, laughing at what was no doubt his stunned demeanour.

"You _grew_, Syaoran!" she exclaimed. "You had a growth spurt!"

"Did I?"

"Yeah, you did!" She grinned. "I could tell! We used to be the same size but now you're half a head taller than me. It's so unfair!"

He smiled back at her. He could practically feel Sakura's cheer sinking into him. "I don't see what's so bad with that," he remarked.

"I do!" Sakura huffed. "It's strange to hug you now. I get a weird feeling…"

"Oh." He understood that. He felt it too. It was the reason they had not hugged when he had let Sakura in the door. "I guess we're not little kids anymore, that's why…"

"I'm not sure I like that," Sakura muttered. "I mean, I can't wait until my coming-of-age ceremony but in another way, I feel like I want to wait forever."

"Hm? What do you mean?"

"I don't really know," Sakura replied, puzzled. "Sometimes, I just have a really good day and I think, 'If time stopped now, I wouldn't mind at all.' I've been having those moments a lot more lately."

"If time stopped…" He mulled over those words in his head. He found himself a little bit shaken, because he understood _exactly _what Sakura meant.

"Sometimes, I'm scared when you leave," she said. "Like maybe you'll just go and never come back."

"I'd never do that!" he insisted strongly.

"I know you wouldn't," said Sakura. She was still rather puzzled. "I think," she continued slowly, as if probing, "maybe it's because I'm scared something might _happen_."

That made him sit up with alacrity. "Like what?"

"I don't know," she said again. "I haven't been having any weird premonitions. You don't have to worry, Syaoran," she added sweetly. "I'm fine, so you can let go…"

It was only then that he realised that he had his arms held protectively around her. It had been an unconscious action, but Sakura's words brought attention to how close they were and her earlier remark about the strange feeling such proximity brought her.

"Ah, sorry!" Hastily, he released Sakura and pressed his hands against his knees instead. He could not look Sakura in the eyes. He did not notice that she was staring at her own knees with equal coyness.

Eventually, she stood up. She was shaking her head vigorously, as if in an effort to regain her former enthusiasm.

"Want to play around town a bit?" she asked. "I don't think my brother will ring the bell for a while yet."

She hesitated for a brief moment and then held out her hand for him. She was determined to forget the strangeness of physical contact – or maybe she wanted to remember more of it. He took her hand because he wanted both those things at once. He had always liked the soft, delicate texture of Sakura's hands.

For them, playing around town was something they had done since childhood. They knew every avenue in the town, all the little shortcuts they could take and which wells had the sweetest water. They knew the townsfolk too; they always greeted the two of them as they walked past. There was a sort of sameness to the experience. He understood what Sakura meant, about moments so quiet and enjoyable he wanted to stop time, just for the sake of living in that painted memory forever.

That night, he lay alone in bed, deep in thought. Time was running out. He was conscious of it, as surely as he was conscious that he was alive and breathing. If he did not find out how to break Sakura's curse, then she would die. He had found out nothing in his travels, nothing at all…

He shivered. Time was running out and he felt an uncontainable urge to do _something. _He had no means of doing so, and the thought of that left him feeling bitter and frustrated.

And then, as he so often did, he thought of Sakura's face, bright and vivid in the window of his recollection. He brought his hands down lower under his bed sheets, until he felt the touch of his own skin. He could hear himself breathing heavily against the softness of his pillow. His flesh felt hot and pulsating down there and he could feel the sweet friction growing between his fingers. He shuffled under the covers, tensing and curling his body. Then he began to stroke himself, at first with a slow deliberate motion before speeding up in time with his panting breaths. With his fingers, he traced the veins on his hard flesh and touched the tip of himself, where he already felt a touch of wetness. All that time he was mouthing words into his pillow – _her _name – and involuntarily, he groaned. He was pulling hard on himself and he could feel something inside of him coiling and tightening relentlessly. It was a sweet agony. Then suddenly, he felt a jerk, a spasm – and for a moment all he could see was blinding whiteness. He fell back after that and the tension in his body eased. He felt, briefly, as if he was riding on a cloud.

Then just as abruptly, he was back in Clow and he could hear the slowing rhythm of his breathing. A hot shame washed over him and he let out an anguished rasp. He had touched his own body with fierce urgency; it only reminded him how much he wanted to touch _her_.

But no! He grimaced. Sakura was a princess and he wasn't even from her world. Protecting her was one thing – it was _his _fault she needed protecting in the first place – but to possess her? The thought repulsed him as much as it appealed to him. And yet… And yet…

He could not bring himself to finish the thought.

Eventually, he fell asleep listening to the sound of the clock ticking on the wall, dividing up the seconds that would never return.

* * *

><p>In the morning, he woke up and coughed. He sniffed. He realised that he had somehow gotten the flu. He had probably contracted it in his travels and was only beginning to show the symptoms. This made him sigh; he resented when he was ill.<p>

He spent most of the morning in bed reading a book, getting up only to prepare a hasty breakfast for himself. He read not just because he needed knowledge more than anything else – he simply liked books. It was difficult to concentrate but he loathed sitting still and doing nothing.

Sakura came around the early afternoon. He had left the door open so that he could let the breeze come in and she entered at her own discretion. She saw him lying on the bed and immediately, her hands flew to her mouth in surprise.

"Syaoran, are you sick?"

"Don't worry," he told her. "It's not that bad. I'll be fine soon." In truth, the sickness had taken a greater hold of him than he expected, but he hated to make Sakura worry.

"Hold still," she said. "I'll get you some water."

And so, it was her turn to protect him.

Sakura returned to his hut the next day to take care of him. Surprisingly, he found out that his words were right: it really wasn't that bad. By the end of the next day, he felt almost completely better.

"Don't scare me like that, Syaoran!" Sakura insisted. "You always push yourself too hard..."

"I'm sorry," he said. And he was. If only, he thought, things were different. A world without any pain or fear, a world for just the two of them...

Suddenly, a silence had fallen between them, broken only by the sound of the clock.

_Tick tock._

_Tick tock._

_Tick tock._

He swallowed, thinking his thoughts from the other night. Abruptly, he sat up straight and yanked on Sakura's arm, pulling her close to him.

She was the one to speak first. "Don't you wish we could be like this forever? That nothing would ever change...?"

"Nothing?" He looked at her. "Nothing at all?"

She was looking back at him. His heart skipped a beat. "M-Maybe some things could change..." she said hesitantly.

She was about to burrow her head back down, but he did not let her. His hands flew to her hair and he drew himself even closer. Close enough, in fact, that he could feel her breath inside of his mouth and taste the sweetness of her tongue.

It took him a moment to realise he was kissing her. When she made a noise – something that sounded halfway between a surprised gasp and a mewl – he realised what he was doing and in that same instant, he drew back, more disgusted with himself than he had ever been.

He would have said something, but knew there was nothing to say. He _knew_ that she was afraid of change, but here he was, ruining the innocence of their friendship with one swift move. He peered hesitantly into Sakura's eyes, fully expecting to see his loathing for himself mirrored there.

He did not find it.

"Oh, Syaoran..." Sakura breathed. "Is that how you feel about me?"

Heart in his mouth, he nodded.

Sakura smiled. It was a bright smile, but different somehow from her other bright smiles. It was like she had tilted it in a different angle and now he was seeing something entirely new in it that only he could see. He did not think he would ever find something he liked better than Sakura's smile except for this. _This_. It was enough to break down every defence he had ever propped up in himself.

"I feel the same," she whispered. "I was going to tell you on my birthday..."

He was horrified. He was anxious. He was delighted. _There's no time_, he thought amid a whirlwind of confused emotions. Even now, their relationship existed on fragments of borrowed time.

So he leaned forward and kissed her again, relishing the taste of her. He kissed her again and again until she responded and threw her arms around him.

And time stood still.

* * *

><p>From there, it seemed as if everything progressed faster and slower than any other time he had ever known. Both tempos seemed like the most natural speed in the world.<p>

The innocence of their trysts now gone, their relationship quickly took on a tone of sweet urgency. They met when they could and for the most part, it was like what it had always been. They did not need to probe each other out or act any differently because they'd had seven years to work all of that out. But something was gone that could never be replaced.

It was impossible for such a development to go unnoticed by those around them. They were young, and young love burned brighter than any other kind.

The logical result was that Touya was meaner to Syaoran than ever. He would never disregard any opportunity to call the young man a brat and to tell him to lay his hands off his sister. Even when Syaoran wasn't around, Touya had many complaints.

"Dump him already," Touya said to his sister.

Her answer was to stick out her tongue at him.

Yet for the most part, the grownups were remarkably tolerant of their relationship, approving even. When they walked through town together hand-in-hand, kindly old ladies would hail them and tell them what a lovely couple they made. Sakura's parents said nothing either way about the subject, but Yukito would tell her later that they were truly proud of their maturing daughter. When she informed Syaoran of this, his reaction was genuine astonishment.

"They don't mind? I thought, because you were a princess..." No matter what she said to him, Syaoran would never completely forget the difference in their social statuses.

Their greater intimacy afforded her a different kind of insight of Syaoran's inner mind. In those days, she thought she could understand every fleeting sentiment that he considered. It made her more anxious on those occasions when she _couldn't _read the expression on his face. Once, she confided about it with Yukito.

"Don't you think Syaoran's the type of boy who takes every burden on himself?" she asked.

Yukito agreed. "I'd say very much so."

"I don't like that," she huffed. "I'm starting to get this feeling that he's _worrying _about something and it's been worrying him for a while. He broods..."

At that point, Yukito gently took her by the shoulders and spoke comfortingly to her. "It's not because he doesn't care about you that he doesn't tell you what he's thinking. I'm sure he cares about you very much."

"I suppose..." she said uncertainly. Then she said, "I'd give him my everything."

"Same for him," Yukito told her. "I'm sure of it."

He did not know how very right he was.

* * *

><p>They made a tiny little spherical world, just for the two of them. Every time they entered that little world, a little bit more of a part of Syaoran that she had never seen would surface. Inside every man there was another man, a hidden man of secret passions who was more beast than man, and Syaoran was beginning to realise his hidden man. She welcomed it, because at that same time, she was realising her hidden woman.<p>

After they were spent, they would lie against each other and listen to the sounds of their beating hearts. It was as steady as the sound of the clock on the wall.

(In the dark, unbidden, the Black Wings on Sakura continued to spread.)


	2. two

**two;**

* * *

><p>It was different after the first time. She had been a bundle of shivering nerves then; her face was flushed and so was her skin. When he touched her, she wanted to pull away because she was hesitant and nervous and she did not want him to hear the frightened, erratic beating of her heart. But then he pressed himself close to her and mouthed wordlessly against her flesh. She could hear his heartbeat then, and his was just as wild and frantic as hers. It startled her; she had just as much of an effect on him as he had on her.<p>

After that, she delighted in his body in a way she had never expected to. She loved to touch him, to hear his breath come short and dissolve into pants. She loved the hardness of his flesh because it was so fascinatingly different from her own body and yet it complemented hers so well. She loved the way he looked at her at these times. He had always been serious and intense, and when he was inside of her, he was so uniquely _him _in a way he had always and never been.

The first time, he had asked it of her. Or more like it had _happened_, but he had taken charge, whispering and easing her into it every step of the way. After that, it was like something had snapped shut around him. He did not ask again.

So she asked him. Whenever they did it, it was because of her – because she would kiss him and tell him how much his touch affected her. She could not imagine doing such a thing with anyone besides him. She would lean into their embraces and when his defences snapped, as they always eventually did, he would touch her more. And she _liked _it when he did.

But afterwards, he would pull out of her soundlessly, and even as he embraced her, no barriers between them, the first thing he would utter was that he was sorry.

* * *

><p><em><strong>Extracts from the journal of Queen Nadeshiko:<strong>_

_... A choice that will bring much pain but may in fact be the key in stopping Fei-Wang Reed..._

_... So he chose this path after all..._

_... And yet the hardest road is for Sakura. I pray for her with all my heart, for a part of me regrets the decision that was taken. How can I help it? I am a woman first, and a mother..._

* * *

><p>Her mother noticed it first. Mothers always did.<p>

Long before any noticeable change came upon Sakura, her mother called her to her chamber. When Sakura came, Nadeshiko could say nothing for a while. She could only embrace her dear, cursed daughter. The Black Wings had grown since yesterday and the day before and the day before that.

It was not the only thing that had grown.

"Tell me, Sakura," her mother whispered gently into her daughter's ear. "How far along are you?"

At those words, Sakura stiffened. It was as if something was going to spill out of her. Yet curiously enough, she was more embarrassed than she was horrified. It was a secret that she had been unsure of how to keep since the very beginning.

"Th-Three months," she stuttered finally.

Nadeshiko closed her eyes. When she opened them again, her daughter was still there in front of her, peering at her anxiously.

"Is that... bad?" Sakura asked worriedly.

"New life is never a bad thing," Nadeshiko replied, and yet still, she felt weary. "But the burden on you will be heavy, I'm afraid."

"If Syaoran and I work together, I'm sure we can take care of it," Sakura insisted. She tried to be bright, although she was beginning to understand the gravity of her situation. "I thought..."

Nadeshiko shook her head. "If that was simply it, your father and I could have arranged for you to be married. But as it is..."

Sakura gasped. The pain spilt through her eyes, and her mother felt it sink into her like a blade. "What do you mean, mother?" Sakura asked.

And Nadeshiko explained. Sakura was a princess of Clow and, as everyone in the kingdom was aware, she had latent powers that surpassed High Priest Yukito's. The purification rite she had engaged in as a child was necessary, not simply for the sake of tradition, but for her powers to nurture. Until her coming-of-age ceremony in six months' time, she was supposed to remain chaste. It was all for the same reasons.

Sakura stared at her mother until the slow, horrifying realisation dawned on her. "Does that mean... I-I've lost my powers?"

Nadeshiko nodded gravely. "Have you been having dreams lately? Can you feel the emotions of water?"

Sakura shook her head, frantically. "N-No, and I didn't notice!" The point of being with Syaoran, she thought, was that they would make a world where time would stop, not crash forward into the future and beyond. She was the one who had brought the unpleasantness upon herself.

She fell into a sober silence for a moment before beginning to sob into her hands.

"I've disappointed you, mother..."

Nadeshiko embraced her again. "No, you haven't, dear."

Sakura was sniffling into her chest. "Why didn't you tell me, mother? That I wasn't meant to do these things...?"

"It didn't matter," Nadeshiko replied. "_He _knew and that was enough."

"Syaoran knew...?"

Nadeshiko nodded. It was certainly Syaoran's way of turning back time. The thought must have haunted him for years: for the sake of tradition, he had avoided grabbing Sakura's hand on that vital pivotal moment that had decided his future.

He could not have afforded to wait.

"I'm scared, mother," Sakura confessed shakily. "I told him I was scared everything would suddenly change and now it has." Gingerly, she laid a hand on her belly. She seemed so remarkably young, little more than a child herself. "What will happen to Syaoran? T-To our...?"

"Be strong," her mother whispered. There was nothing more comforting that she could say. The dark days had come.

* * *

><p>Sakura's parents advised her to remain purely within the castle from now on. To this she wholeheartedly obliged; she had always loved her parents unconditionally and she felt no need to rebel against their kind intentions.<p>

The only problem this caused was with Syaoran. She had no opportunity to see him and tell him what was happening with her. Until the day she told her mother, she had spoken of her condition to no one, not even him. She longed to tell him about it now and to ask him what it was that had been bothering him. Had it been _that_? Was it because he already knew what he had been doing to her?

Now that her mother had pointed out the loss of her powers, this became painfully evident to her in the following months. She had always felt that the world around her had a voice and that on particularly bright and beautiful days she could feel the world whispering and bathing in its own radiance around her. Suddenly, it was as if the beating of the world's heart had died down altogether. There was no more voice. She began to see her surroundings as ordinary people saw it, yet she was so accustomed to believing in the world's mysticism that the absence of it was in itself a kind of farce. And so she had another reason to stay inside, for she did not want to see the deadness of the world that she had never noticed before.

Her body was changing too. It felt tender and fragile these days and on some days, she felt weary and fatigued. Her mother understood the symptoms of pregnancy and helped to assist her when she could while keeping the secret, but as three months turned to four and then to five, it was impossible to hide what was happening.

Her father and Yukito were the next to learn. Her mother discussed with her father what had happened and these days, the two of them walked about the castle with eternally melancholy expressions. Sakura felt an enormous guilt in her heart, just above where the baby grew, if only for _that_. As for Yukito, he had found out the truth by himself, probably as early as Nadeshiko found out. He only spoke of it to Sakura later, to tell her that someone had to tell Touya and could that person be him? Sakura told him yes, oh please, Yukito-san, yes,and then she went to the privacy of her bedroom and burst into tears.

The next day Syaoran came and it was the worst time he could have chosen.

She was playing on the steps leading to the front garden the way she had done as a child, when there was no one to play with and there was nothing else to do. She could not skip and prance around any longer as she had done in the past; now, she sat down upon the steps and rocked her bare feet back and forth, watching their repetitive motion wistfully.

Then she heard the voices. The sound of them ringing so sharply across the courtyard was what made her jolt and sit upright and then pale and screw her face in anguish.

"HOW DARE YOU SHOW YOUR FACE HERE? !" It was Touya, louder and more furious than she had ever heard him. "_After what you did to my sister...!"_

Syaoran said something, too quietly for her to hear.

"_SORRY? !" _Her brother roared in response. "YOU SAY YOU'RE _SORRY_? ! SORRY WON'T CUT IT, YOU LITTLE ASSHOLE!"

Sakura sprang to her feet and sprinted all the way to the courtyard. The blood was rushing to her head. She arrived to see Touya punching Syaoran in the face, again and again and again, as if the teen was nothing more than a punching bag. And Syaoran was simply taking each blow with a resigned, miserable expression on his face. Sakura arrived, and for a brief moment, their eyes met. Then Syaoran blinked and looked away as Touya pummelled him to the cold stone floor.

"Big brother, _stop it_!" Sakura screeched.

But the righteous anger of an older brother was not something that could be so easily stopped. Touya waited until Syaoran had struggled back to his feet and then punched him again. Syaoran stumbled backwards, clutching a bleeding nose.

"This horny bastard got you _pregnant_," Touya snapped. "How could he have been so fucking _selfish_? !"

"But it was me!" Sakura insisted. "I was the selfish one! So please...!"

Touya growled. He seemed about to launch into another tirade when Yukito's voice cut across the courtyard.

"Calm yourself, Touya! Can't you see you're making this situation worse for everyone?" Yukito was standing at the opposite end of the courtyard, evidently having only just arrived. Gone was his easy, mellow expression. He stood tall and firm and gazed Touya down, serious and intent like he had never been.

And Touya listened, because Yukito was his best friend, and as his best friend, he knew what every expression on his face meant.

Yet still Touya's ire had not calmed.

"But _Yukito_-!"

"Quiet." Yukito came closer. He placed a restraining palm against Touya's cheek. "You're upsetting Sakura-chan."

Finally, Touya hesitated and glanced in Sakura's direction. She gazed tearfully back at him.

Then unexpectedly, Touya's eyebrows creased, not into an expression of anger but of deepest sorrow.

"Why, Sakura?" he asked plaintively. "_Why_?"

Sakura looked down at her feet, unable to answer. She noticed her legs were trembling.

Then she heard a scrambling of movement to ahead of her. Syaoran had gotten down to his knees and was bowing his head against the ground in a most desperate humble gesture.

"I want to take responsibility," he said. His voice sounded thick. "Please... please! I'll do anything. I'll marry her!"

His words made struck keenly at her because he said them so earnestly and _oh, Syaoran_, she thought. It was almost more than she could take, and she could not bear to meet his eyes.

"Don't be ridiculous," Touya answered scornfully. "You should be grateful you're even still alive, you brat."

Yukito left Touya's side and came to Syaoran. Gingerly, he lifted Syaoran's head up from its downward pointed angle. "Listen," he said; his kindness was back. "I don't blame you. I know you're a decent, honest young man and I don't doubt you would have been able to take care of Sakura-chan. But you've broken a taboo. You said yourself you value our laws and traditions. Surely you know what this means."

Wordlessly, Syaoran nodded. His face was drawn and pale.

"You're to be banished from the Kingdom of Clow," Yukito said quietly. "Forever."

* * *

><p>They gave him a grace period of one week to gather his possessions together, but Syaoran chose to leave much earlier than that. He did so quietly, unobtrusively, because for all his actions, the last thing he wanted to do was to leave a burden upon everyone. By now, news of Sakura's pregnancy had reached everyone in town and wherever Syaoran went, he heard the whisperings not so far behind him.<p>

"What a cad!" he heard the villagers say. "Getting her pregnant and running off...!"

These biting remarks hurt him, but in response, all he could ever do was to fasten his travel cloak a little bit tighter around himself. Because the truth was that he deserved every cruelty that was inflicted on him.

When he came to Clow's border, he saw Queen Nadeshiko standing, a lone figure among the sands. She had her hood pulled over her head to protect her from the desert wind, although he could recognise her from the long, flowing hair spilling around her shoulders. She was grasping her staff in her hand. When she noticed him draw near, she turned to him and nodded in acknowledgment.

As custom dictated, she explained his punishment. "When you leave, I will cast a spell. This spell will ensure that you never find this country again, no matter how hard you search or how close you come."

He swallowed. Even at the ending, all he could think of was Sakura's smiling face... "I'm ready," he told the queen.

Nadeshiko nodded again. Syaoran closed his eyes, feeling the wind and sand whip against his skin and hair. Then Nadeshiko spoke once again.

"Thank you," she said.

"Why?" he asked her.

"Fei-Wang Reed cannot use my daughter's power for evil any longer. You might have given her a burden but you eased our world of a greater one."

"Don't put it like that," he said.

"Syaoran..."

"I don't care about Fei-Wang," he declared bitterly. "I don't care about whether or not his wishes come true. All I care about – all I ever cared about – is Sakura. And now I can't even save her from that curse. I hate myself. It's my fault she'll die. All I've ever brought her is pain and death. I'm so selfish!"

His outburst was more violent and intense than anything he had ever mustered in his life. He was physically shaking, his gloved hands pressed tightly against his face.

"I never deserved an ounce of her kindness!" he snarled. Then, more quietly and more shakily and with all the loneliness in the world: "Not ever..."

_Such a tragedy_, Nadeshiko thought, _when such lovely fruit ripens too early._

"But there was no time," she said softly. "You did all you could. You would have saved her if you could."

But there were no more words to be coaxed from him. He pulled his own hood over his head and wordlessly made his way across the border without showing a hint of another emotion. Then Nadeshiko had no choice but to recite the spell and that was that.

* * *

><p>The following months passed at an agonisingly slow rate. Sakura seldom left the confines of her room. She swathed herself in blankets and spent the days of her pregnancy inert. She was told to stay still, but if she had to be honest with herself, she would not have been able to bring herself into moving if she had the opportunity to anyway. If her family and Yukito had not been so kind to her in this time, she would have felt happier, in a way. She could have hated them all for separating her from Syaoran. She could have contemplated something stupid like fleeing the country, even though she had never been outside Clow before, had no idea where to find Syaoran and was by now heavily pregnant. She could have had some hopes to cling to.<p>

But as it was, she remained in the castle, seeing little and perceiving even less. The one thing she found herself regretting was how she never found the opportunity to say goodbye to Syaoran at his banishment. So she said it within the boundaries of her own mind a thousand times over, each time with a thousand different little variations. And it would hurt, each and every time.

(In the dark, unbidden, the Black Wings on Sakura continued to spread.)**  
><strong>


	3. three

**three;**

* * *

><p>The man let out a rasp that sounded as if there was something thick and heavy lodged inside his throat. Little wonder – the tip of a sword was pressed against his neck.<p>

Seconds ago, he had made the mistake of attempting to steal from a young, harmless-looking teenage boy who had been passing through the alleyway. He had placed his hand on the boy's shoulder and told him if he wanted to pass through here, he needed to give up his wallet. It made sense, after all – it was a dark, grimy alleyway and on some days the man saw rats bigger than his hand scurry around the walls. If he wanted to live outside the alleyway, he needed to make enough money to make it happen.

Unfortunately, there was the first matter he had to attend to, which was the boy's sword. Not to mention the eerily calm and detached expression on the boy's face. From the look in his eyes, he seemed so much older than a boy of perhaps fourteen or fifteen. While he had one hand on the sword, his other hand was grasped tightly on the man's wrist. The man had been holding a knife, but because of the boy's vice-like grip, the knife was completely useless.

It was a strange, uncomfortable feeling to be so ruthlessly overpowered by such a slim boy. The man felt an uncontrollable shiver pass through him and suddenly, he found himself screaming let go _LET GO_.

So the boy did, but the frigidness in his gaze was still there. A few months ago, he could not have conceived acting this way even in self-defence, but he was alone and friendless now.

The only person who had ever understood him was miles away in a country he could never return to, pregnant with his child.

* * *

><p><em><strong>Extracts from the journal of Queen Nadeshiko:<strong>_

… _There is in fact a way to remove the curse on Sakura. The Time-Space Witch spoke of it in dreams…_

… _A life. A life must be sacrificed. But not just any life can suffice. The lifeblood of someone who is precious to the princess must be taken; a price equal to the amount that will be given. That is the way wishes are granted…_

* * *

><p>Syaoran straightened up and peered at the assortment of goods the vendor had laid on his carpet. There was a considerable variety: a collection of thick, hard-covered tomes lay in a pile in the top right part of the carpet. Below that there were two rustic-looking keys each about the size of a garden peg; they were gold and silver-coloured respectively. To the left of them was a pile of coloured stones. Some were dim and faded while others were bright and rainbow-coloured. In the bottom left corner of the carpet there was a folded black cloth and on top of it a handful of paper charms with foreign script written on them. And in the top left corner there was a pack of cards.<p>

Syaoran picked them up and scrutinised them carefully. The image of a sun encased in a magic circle was emblazoned on their rear faces. The front faces of the cards depicted pictures: sometimes of women, sometimes of animal, sometimes of objects. And all the cards were labelled with names.

_The Windy. The Maze. The Sword. The Shield._

There were about as many cards as a deck of playing cards.

"What are these?" he asked the vendor. The vendor was an old, bespectacled man whose beard was not really that long; it had been shaven down to stubble. He had been reading one of his books – the title of it was in the same foreign language as the paper charms – when Syaoran asked his question.

"Those are Clow Cards," the old man explained patiently. "Or, to be more accurate, they are _replicas _of the Clow Cards."

"The Clow Cards…" Syaoran murmured. The cards felt thick and heavy in his hand, as if they were weighted down with something that he could not see. "Are they connected to the Kingdom of Clow?"

"Yes." The old man nodded. "They are both connected to Clow Reed."

Syaoran did not respond to that. He was looking through the cards. He stopped at the card that depicted an old, wizened woman in a robe holding an hourglass. _The Time._

"The cards were made with no intention of good and evil in mind," said the old man. "They are like wishes themselves."

"I wish…" Syaoran began, and then he stopped. "I can't," he said. "I have to _do_, not wish."

"You cannot escape wishing," said the old man with a shake of his head. "When your wish comes true through your own merits, your price was your effort. But having a wish itself is the power that changes the universe, whether they are granted or not."

Then he said, "What is _your _wish?"

"To go back," said Syaoran.

"To where?"

To Clow? To Sakura? To _that moment_? Helplessly, Syaoran shook his head.

Before he could answer, the old man said, "Here." He was holding a vial in his hand. Inside the vial there lay specks of gold-flecked dust. "If I sprinkle this on you, you will remember the thing you want the most."

Syaoran hesitated for a moment, and then reached into his travel bag and pulled out his remaining coins. "Please," he said, and placed the coins on the carpet in front of the vendor.

And so the old man dipped his finger into the vial and sprinkled the dust over Syaoran's eyes.

Instantly, it was as Syaoran he was no longer in the vendor. He was no longer anywhere. He was floating. And he was remembering: not a particular person, not a particular thing, not a particular place. He was remembering a feeling.

He could not describe the feeling because he _was _the feeling. To describe the feeling would mean to lose touch with it, to see it through the lenses that meant everything was said and done. Because he had the feeling with him, he suddenly and abruptly found himself face-to-face with Sakura. It was Sakura when she was young and he had first met her, and she was smiling up at the heavens, radiantly as if she was a beam of sunlight herself.

"_Maybe our meeting was Hitsuzen, too!" _she said with a girlish giggle, and he felt nothing so very earth-shaking from it, because that wasn't part of the feeling. Then he was down on earth, his feet touching lightly upon the grass, and Sakura was beside him, tossing a bunch of sweet-smelling flowers his way. His feeling remembered that it was embarrassing but also that he liked it, and his feeling also remembered that the sky was so very, very blue today. He wanted to trace each cloud with his finger, but instead, his feeling fell back and simply imagined what it would be like. His feeling could fly, it could leap between mountains, swim across oceans. He hooked his little finger with Sakura's and as he watched her, it seemed as if she was sprouting wings from behind her. His feeling could not even remember what the Black Wings looked like: these ones were white. He liked these wings. He leaned forward and touched them and suddenly his feeling was spinning around where it stood. He waited until he was still, and then he laughed and laughed and laughed, until the sides of his feeling were aching and all he wanted, nothing more, nothing less, was to fall asleep in the shade.

Eventually, Syaoran woke up, startled, and the feeling cowed and shrank away, disturbed from its nest.

"I want more of that dust," Syaoran rasped. "I want to remember that feeling again." What it had been, he did not know – he could put no name to it because it was both everything and nothing at all. The old man peered at him sombrely through his glasses and said:

"How would you do it?"

"I'll save her," said Syaoran firmly. "And then I'll remember…"

"Is that the course you want to take? You don't want to go back?"

"If I go back," Syaoran answered, "I'll have forgotten what everything means. And I'll just lose that feeling again and I'll have the same regrets. But if I had _time_…!"

"Ah," said the old man. He seemed close to smiling. "Time, huh?"

And in the moment, he perceived that the future had split itself into two paths. In one future, Syaoran was on his hands and knees, begging to go back in time, back to the day when he could have grabbed Sakura's hand and saved her from the curse. Back to before he had tainted her. Back to before he had realised his selfishness.

And there was another future, _this _future. Syaoran's face was clouded in the shadowy light of the vendor, and there was steel in what could be seen of his eyes. There was also something very much like callousness, because the feeling was as selfish as it was selfless, as ruthless as it was altruistic.

"I want to go back to Clow," he said.

* * *

><p>It was Sakura's birthday.<p>

"Fifteen, huh?" said Touya, standing over her bed. He was smiling ruefully and he rubbed his cheek. "You're getting old."

"You're a dinosaur," Sakura retorted. She smiled feebly.

"But you're still too young," said Touya. "Still way too young…" His voice choked slightly.

The smile faded from Sakura's face as it easily could, nowadays. "I know," she said quietly. "I agree."

Touya frowned.

"Don't be scary, big brother," she told him. "You frown so much around me. You mustn't frown around the baby too, when it's born… It'll grow up looking scary like you!"

She patted her stomach – her large, round, grossly pregnant stomach, and this time she tried to smile again, and it was a smile of tentative rediscovery.

"You know," she said softly. "I wonder if this didn't happen to me, would I ever have realised how much I really love you?"

And she was _herself_, Touya knew. The light in her eyes was different but still so inherently _Sakura_.

Suddenly, she gasped. "It's… I feel it…!" Her breath hitched. "It's starting…!"

Wordlessly, her brother embraced her.

* * *

><p>"I know the way to get back to Clow," said the old man in the vendor.<p>

Syaoran felt his breath quicken. "How?"

"An incantation," the old man replied. "A spell that bypasses the barrier that the Queen of Clow erected."

"How do you…? Is this a coincidence?"

"There is no such thing as coincidence. There is only Hitsuzen."

Syaoran nodded, accepting the explanation. Before his eyes, it seemed as if the old man was changing. His features were softening, becoming younger. His hair filled out and turned to black and he stood up tall instead of slouching.

"There is no time," said Clow Reed. "The curse will take her life today."

He was dressed in a long, flowing robe. When he lifted his arms, the sleeves of his robe fell, revealing on his arm the very same mark of death that had been on Sakura.

Syaoran bit his lip. He declared strongly: "I will not let Sakura die!" And after that, he fell silent and braced himself for the next words that needed to be heard.

"And your price?" Clow Reed asked.

"My sword," Syaoran answered promptly.

"For the spell, I will take that, but to save her, you need more."

Syaoran nodded. He knew. He knew all too well.

As Clow Reed began to chant, the floor of the vendor lit up beneath Syaoran and him. Within his head, like a mantra, Syaoran repeated his wish: _I will not let Sakura die. I will not let Sakura die._

_I will not let her die._

* * *

><p>After her waters broke, Sakura spent her birthday in bed, feeling the contractions dig painfully into her. Her mother was beside her now, whispering words of comfort in her ear, telling her when to push and when to hold herself back. Her father and brother were there, watching, yet unable to bear doing so at the same time. And yet still they remained, and Sakura was weeping now. She thought of Syaoran, wishing that he could have been there to see the child being born. She thought of the days she had spent hearing her child kick inside of her, and of the occasions she had placed her hand over her belly and felt the life inside of her grow. <em>Oh, Syaoran…! Syaoran…!<em>

As the hours ticked by, Sakura felt her vision and perception dim, like everything was closing and swallowing itself up around her. There was blood. She saw it stain the sheets and at first, it shocked and pained her, but as the blood continued to flow and nothing changed, she then felt dizzy. Then slowly, gradually, the pain dulled her senses. She tried to think, but her mind was slower than it had ever been. Each contraction made her think that this was it, the time had come, but there was simply no knowing. She knew nothing except for Syaoran, and she repeated the name of her child's father again and again within the dullness of her mind, because to her it was the only thing that mattered now.

He was _there _with her, she knew. She could not comprehend the fact well enough to appreciate it, but he was _there_. He was breathing beside her and he was gazing at her with pure, sweet affection. When he had appeared, she did not know; she was quite sure that he could also simply be a figment of her imagination. But he made her smile, and her lips parted, and even in her pain, all she could think of was: _It'll be okay..._

And time stood still.

* * *

><p>Syaoran appeared, encompassed by a flickering circle of light, seconds before the curse took hold. When he appeared, Sakura's family members could do nothing but gape at him, and Syaoran turned instantly to face Sakura.<p>

She was lying there on the bloodstained bed sheets, her half-lidded eyes peering at him uncomprehendingly. Her lips parted slightly. She was pale and her hair was wild and tousled across the sheets. Her legs were parted in an undignified manner, revealing the hairless head of a bloodstained infant. Sakura's mother had been grasping at it with her hands when Syaoran appeared and now that he was there, her hands fell away and her mouth opened in pure astonishment.

Sakura's parted lips curled upwards.

Syaoran had time to utter her name – softly, lovingly – and to begin to reach for her hands.

Then the shadows impaled her.

The first thing Syaoran comprehended was her eyes: they widened and yet she had comprehended nothing yet. Her eyes widened because she had noticed him. They were warm with love and kindness and everything else that was _Sakura_. The shadows were sharp and lethal like daggers. They had sprouted from the same blackness as the mark of death and they had stabbed Sakura through from behind. It was all a clean cut, a very clinical death. There were so many shadows slicing through her that Syaoran could not count them.

And still he stared at her eyes. It seemed everything had gone still. He could hear himself breathe, even, and nothing had changed, but he could not hear _her_ breathe, not even shallow breathing. She did not blink. She did not move.

It took him a moment of sheer, blind panic before he realised that time had in fact stopped at this very moment.

Nadeshiko collapsed on the ground, clutching her chest.

"I used… the last of my strength…" she gasped, "… to freeze time… You must save her!"

Syaoran knew wordlessly that Sakura's mother had sacrificed her life for the sake of her daughter. He sprang towards Sakura then, but not touching her. He strained to look at her body, the lower part naked and bloody before him.

The clocks had frozen on the wall. Nevertheless, he could hear them ticking incessantly within his mind.

_Even when time stops, it moves…_

If he did not move quickly, both Sakura and the child would be dead. His mind went blank, and his hands, possessed by some monster that could only think of protecting Sakura, began to move on their own accord.

* * *

><p>And finally, there came that moment – a moment of supreme, utter relief that he was shaking where he stood. The shadows were gone around Sakura and her expression was the same and there was still so much blood but that didn't matter anymore, did it…?<p>

Time moved again when the curse was broken.

Sakura blinked, first of all. She was faint and weak from loss of blood, but she knew now without a doubt that it was Syaoran before her. Even in her fragile state of mind, she could recognise him. She recognised him even though he was almost unrecognisable himself.

He was covered in blood.

It was all over his hands and it was smeared liberally across his face. It dripped off his eyelids and off the tips of his fingers and his matted hair, and the drops fell on the bed sheets. Some of the drops even landed on Sakura's bare skin.

She recognised him because he was smiling. His eyes were creased into his kind and genuine smile – the one he gave her to let her know she meant the world to him. But there was something different, too, about it. They shone with a manic, frenzied gleam, like he was just beginning to exhaust himself from a panic. But he was _smiling _his most brilliant, dazzling smile.

He was holding their baby in his arms. It was naked, tiny and fragile. Sakura identified it immediately as a girl.

Then its head fell off its shoulders.

It landed with a soft, unassuming plop on Sakura's naked stomach. Its eyes were closed shut and its cheekbones were fat and plump, like a soft, squishy toy. The rest of the body, which Syaoran still held tightly in his arms, was nothing but a bloody mess of limp flesh.

Sakura screamed. She swiped her hand across her stomach and knocked her decapitated daughter's head off her body in one motion. The head skidded across the floor, landing by her father's feet.

No one said anything for a moment. Nadeshiko was nothing but a crumpled, lifeless body on the floor. Touya and Fujitaka stared at the baby's head blankly, because the horror had not yet struck them.

And with exquisite tenderness, Syaoran took hold of Sakura's sweaty, limp hand and began to cry tears of joy.

"You're safe, Sakura…! I'm glad, I'm so glad! We can be together now! We'll remember that feeling now!"

Sakura fainted then; the overpowering stench of her blood and the baby's was simply too much for her to handle.

* * *

><p><em>While we drift inside the darkness<br>Like innocent little birds, we huddled our wings together  
>You, who hide behind your smile when you're lonely<br>Are a blade of unmelting ice  
>I bare my heart and embrace you<br>I'm by your side  
>Forever…<em>

"… Why?" she should have asked, her voice cracking and her heart thumping in trepidation.

He would be wracked in grief by then, and nothing would be the same. He would be nothing but a caricature of a man, and like a broken record he would repeat for her the final resolve of his. He would make her live because that was their price now. Time had run out and still it progressed.

"But why?" she should have asked him again.

And now that emotion would flood into his eyes, the one that spoke of endings and beginnings, of things that had bloomed and things that would wither. It spoke of the feeling that had been erased without a murmur, never to be acknowledged again except with bittersweet fondness.

"Because I love you," he would say.

**fin**

* * *

><p><strong>Afterword: <strong>… the fuck did I just write?

Well, seriously speaking, though, I can't really call this fic anything particularly new for me because all the elements in it are things I've written before. It's not my first AU, nor is it my first story with horror themes, nor is it my first lemon. But this is definitely the most mature story I've written and will probably remain that way for a while. I will say I definitely felt squeamish writing this, particularly with the penultimate scene.

In terms of inspiration, I'd have to credit Stephen King for being a boss, although the actual horror part of this fic was original. You might find this surprising given his treatment in the story, but I actually _do _like Syaoran. The SyaoSaku pairing, though, comes across as a bit too romanticised to me, so while I did feel _quite _guilty writing a teenage pregnancy plot for them, it was the direction I wanted to take their relationship. I wanted to touch on this idea of obsessive, blind young love and the theme of lost time and innocence. That being said, I did try my best to keep both characters in-character, while twisting them to suit the darker elements of the plot. Obviously, these are themes the original series never explored to much depth, so simply having the scenario there was going to skew the characters. So rather than go for a sweet, fluffy or even an angsty piece, I wrote this story with the intention of shock value in mind. Honestly speaking, it's not really my favourite story and nor would I expect it to be yours, but it's something new from the other fanfics that focus on relationships. I hope you can appreciate it through that light, at least.

For those who have me on alert, my next fic will definitely be much lighter fare. Look forward to it!

Edit (17/09/11): In the end, I decided to go against my earlier logic and separate the chapters for no better reason besides I look more accomplished with completed chaptered fics under my belt. Pffffft.


End file.
